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The best league in England is... the Championship!

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woodlebert said:
Because the quality is higher so it's better IMO
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When you balance everything up, the Championship is the best league going as far as I'm concerned, and it's something I've said for several years. However, the quality is poor when compared to the Premier League (and has been getting poorer), and everything that goes in its favour in comparison to the top league (openness and unpredictability mainly) can also be said about the other professional leagues in England.
 

AC Mack said:
When you balance everything up, the Championship is the best league going as far as I'm concerned, and it's something I've said for several years. However, the quality is poor when compared to the Premier League (and has been getting poorer), and everything that goes in its favour in comparison to the top league (openness and unpredictability mainly) can also be said about the other professional leagues in England.
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Agreed it can, and because it's the highest quality of the competitive leagues, it's the best. I'm looking forward to following it more closely this season
 
Nookster said:
Great article in Football365

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'None of us have a clue who will finish in the top six places in the Championship.
None of Watford, Burnley or Norwich look guaranteed to go back up.
A team can lose 12 games in a season and still get promoted.
Huddersfield finished third last season, but 20th the season before.
4 early losses won’t end your season in September.
Halfway through & in the bottom third - a good run of results can still get you into the play-offs.
Hope is what keeps fans coming back that and the sheer habit of being present.
The Premier League we already know the top 2 & the next 4
For the other 14, the relegation battle is where their fun lies now.
If you’re not poor enough to go down, it can be a long second half of the season.'

Can't wait for this Sunday, it's the hope...
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I particularly like the idea that 4 early losses won't lead to disaster!
 
Most of my favourite seasons following the lads have been in the second tier.

Promotion under Ken Knighton, Dennis Smith, Mick McCarthy, Reidy and Keano.
 
When your team is competing in the PL, there’s no better league to watch. I like the Championship as it’s hard, but the quality isn’t there in comparison. Having some of the best players in world come to your stadium and you get a result against them is unreal. Just look at the Chelsea game when Defoe scored the 3rd, the noise and atmosphere was superb.
 
I think without the dusting of genuinely top class players it's not far behind mid 90s Premier League in terms of quality.
 
Nookster said:
Great article in Football365

You must be logged on to see external links

'None of us have a clue who will finish in the top six places in the Championship.
None of Watford, Burnley or Norwich look guaranteed to go back up.
A team can lose 12 games in a season and still get promoted.
Huddersfield finished third last season, but 20th the season before.
4 early losses won’t end your season in September.
Halfway through & in the bottom third - a good run of results can still get you into the play-offs.
Hope is what keeps fans coming back that and the sheer habit of being present.
The Premier League we already know the top 2 & the next 4
For the other 14, the relegation battle is where their fun lies now.
If you’re not poor enough to go down, it can be a long second half of the season.'

Can't wait for this Sunday, it's the hope...
Click to expand...
Thou you need the PL money even if one year then parachute money to survive as a club in the Championship over a long period of time….
 
Been dull as fuck the past couple of years, could be wrong but it feels like there's been less goals in the past couple of seasons than ever before and that's even including Mitrovic scoring nearly a billion last year.

Amount of managers who are defensively minded seems to have multiplied in the Champo more so than anywhere else.
 
scott934 said:
I think L1 is better for the unpredictability.
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Well said. I mean I didn’t like the idea of us playing Gillingham whilst Middlesbrough were playing someone like Stoke City or Birmingham City. But I knew we had a good chance of winning games. I don’t know where our wins are going to come from in the Championship. You have a better chance of seeing a win during the season than you do in the Championship because the teams aren’t so tough. Aren’t full of quality signings.
 
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its the most competitive league , a dog eat dog league , obviously the premier league is better for quality , , but the championship encompasses diferent levels of ineptness from the down right dire to players who belong at a higher level .
 
Obviously the PL is the place to be, just for the prestige, but if, like me, you are an old fogie, the Championship is the closest you will get to the good old days of the 60s/70s football.
 
ShieldsBlackCat2015 said:
Well said. I mean I didn’t like the idea of us playing Gillingham whilst Middlesbrough were playing someone like Stoke City or Birmingham City. But I knew we had a good chance of winning games. I don’t know where our wins are going to come from in the Championship. You have a better chance of seeing a win during the season than you do in the Championship because the teams aren’t so tough. Aren’t full of quality signings.
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Whopper.
 
offmenut said:
Was chatting to some Bournemouth fans who were gutted they got promoted.
They enjoyed it last time and felt they had a chance, this time they know it will be a matter of time (probably this season) when they are relegated. They have loved the championship and aren’t looking forward to this coming season
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Bet it will be fun for them to be in mid-table obscurity in the Championship with no hopes of making the playoffs
 
offmenut said:
Was chatting to some Bournemouth fans who were gutted they got promoted.
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Talk to Brentford fans and they''ll all agree that getting promoted was anything but "gutting", it was glorious.

And that includes the section who feared we''d come straight back down again, if not first season, then within another one or two.
offmenut said:
They enjoyed it last time and felt they had a chance, this time they know it will be a matter of time (probably this season) when they are relegated.
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For the majority of promoted teams, actually getting up represented the limit of their abiliity, hence why so many go straight back down again. Imo the key to survival is actually twofold:
1. Not to go up before you're (genuinely) ready - Brentford had two failed play-off attempts before finally going up the third time. Of course they''d never have refused an earlier promotion, but had they managed it, as they might, they'd have been far less prepared and able to compete in the PL;
2. Don't just get promoted, then start to think about what to do once you get there. If you have to recruit a load of players in the summer after going up, it's probably too late. This is because it is MUCH harder to improve a squad in the PL than the Championship - better players obviously cost more, and there is greater competition to sign them. And even if you can do it, bringing in a stack of new players in a rush doesn''t do much for stability or consistency. And the stability which comes from long-term planning is critical to long-term survival.
offmenut said:
They have loved the championship and aren’t looking forward to this coming season
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They might not like the Championship so much if they go back down again but then end up doing a Sheff Wed, an Ipswich or (no offence) a Sunderland by going further down again. Or even if doomed to a long spell in the Championship wilderness like eg Forest, Stoke or Leeds. At least all those clubs had the stature and history etc to maintain them during the bad days, but Bournemouth?

Which is why Brentford recognise the need to be sustainable with the new stadium and training ground etc, and keep within FFP wherever we end up, else it could happen to us. While there is no chance that our owner/benefactor will one day decide to pull the plug and take his money back - I wouldn't be quite so sure about Bournemouth's owner, the Russian businessman Maxim Denim, mind.

P.S. If Brentford should crash and burn, I reserve the right to deny that I ever typed any of this - I must have been hacked or something ;)
 
I don’t really see the logic in this argument, it’s like saying “F2 is better than F1 because only Merc, Redbull or Ferrari are going to win” unpredictability is fun, but it’s just one factor and I think everyone would want to be in the top league of any sport given the option.
 
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